The Old Reactor

by David Ohle

  When the sun rose he put on his uniform and went out onto Arden Boulevard, but because Altobello’s streetcars ran only every other day, he had to walk the twelve city blocks to the Tunney Arms, a rooming house on the west side. He didn’t know Altobello well but had seen maps. Other new arrivals told him they’d heard that west-side jellyheads were popping out of alleyways or abandoned buildings or anywhere and spraying free men and women with aerosol deformant, scarring some of them for life.

  Moldenke proceeded with caution, always looking around as he walked. The west side was unpainted and neglected, with shabby rooming houses offering free accommodations for new arrivals. The Tunney was no different. It was dilapidated outside and smelled of mold in the foyer. Along with the papers ordering him to Altobello, Moldenke showed the concierge his pass card and was assigned a room. “Freedom isn’t free, mister,” she said. “No bath, no kitchen, no nothing. And we’re mostly full, too, so you’re lucky there’s a room at all. Eat and do your business on the street. And be careful. There’re some bad jellies out there.”

  “So I’ve heard. I’ll watch out. Is there a bakery anywhere near? I love bear claws.”

  “There’s one over in the Quarter. If you need anything, the Quarter’s where you’ll find it. There’s nothing around here but Saposcat’s, privies, and rooms. There’s a streetcar that goes there.”

  “Thank you for the information. Good night.”

  “If you have any trouble, please don’t wake me.”

  “I won’t.”

  The room was furnished with a bare cot; a plastic table; a wooden chair; and a small, splintery dresser. When Moldenke opened its top drawer out of general curiosity he found an aged copy of Burke’s Treatise on the Sublime and the Beautiful.

  There was a north-facing casement window that only opened halfway and couldn’t close completely. But it let in just enough light that he could read himself to sleep. He had no interest in Burke’s Treatise or anything else, but studying the impenetrable sentences and unfamiliar words first made his vision blur. He lay in the cot and held the book out to catch the best light. Doing so, he managed to read a few strings of words, leading him to understand that pain and pleasure were not opposite ends of a continuum, the presence of pain was not the absence of pleasure, and that indifference was the state of mind when neither was present.

  Not long after he fell asleep and slept all day and most of the night.

  It was revealed today in Altobello that Scientist Zanzetti locked himself into a shielded cubicle inside a small reactor of his own design. Standing with his head and shoulders visible in the tiny viewing cubicle, he could be seen staring distantly and playing with his fingers. He rarely spoke and then only to ask for barrel honey with which to smooth and groom the long silky black hairs of his chin beard. Every day he was furnished with a lead-lined frock and turban. Observers claim they could detect a cosmic and benign sadness in his misty, deep black eyes. Some thought he was intercepting messages intended for jellyhead sacks.

  For breakfast the following day, Moldenke walked to a Saposcat’s Deli close by, ate a bowl of scrapple, and drank a cup of strong tea, crowded as it was with a mix of free people and peaceable jellies, After that, he wandered around the west side, taking in the sights, such as they were. He learned quickly that bricks often fell from the tallest downtown buildings whenever a streetcar went by. He had to alternate looking up for falling bricks and looking down for the occasional sinkhole in the sidewalk. A broken ankle or a fractured skull would be disastrous. The hospitals closed only days after Altobello was liberated.

  When he came to Liberty Park, a former urban green space that had apparently evolved into something of a jelly-head encampment and cemetery, Moldenke saw their underfed children roaming aimlessly, one of them chasing a rat. Another drank rain water from a puddle.

  He walked generally and slowly past the grave of a jellyhead, who by custom were buried vertically and upside down, feet protruding from the earth. There was just a pile of toe bones left, a few toenails, and a gnarled shoe.

  He picked up his pace until he was some distance from the Park, not far from the Quarter, which he was curious to see. He caught the Arden car at the next stop, showed his card, and took a seat. A few jellyheads across the aisle engaged in lively conversation. They seemed the harmless type, not likely to be carrying deformant. One of them leaned across the aisle and asked Moldenke if he would mind settling a dispute. “Glad to,” he said.

  “Tell us, in his famous Treatise, which concept does Burke say is the more compelling, that of the sublime or that of the beautiful?”

  “I’m sorry to say, I haven’t read much of it yet.”

  “You must. It’s all the rage. Everyone’s reading it.”

  “Thank you. I’ll make a point of finishing it.”

  There was a crossing gate at the entrance to the Quarter. The car stopped and someone looking very official got aboard with a billy bat, slapping it rhythmically against his thigh. He walked slowly up and down the aisle, looking at passengers’ faces, sometimes stopping to sniff the air around their seating area or to reach down and feel the passenger’s heartbeat, perhaps to see if they might guilty of some infringement and feeling anxious. It was unclear to Moldenke what more the official was trying to determine, but whatever it was, Moldenke only received a brief glance with no hint of suspicion. When the inspection was over, the car rolled on to the Quarter. Knowing nothing of the place, he got off at the first stop, chose a direction at random, and began walking.

  Photographers’ bulbs flashed as two hundred jellyheads stood in the mud of City Park Wednesday night awaiting a miracle. They watched a nine-year-old jellyhead, Joseph Vitolo, pray at an improvised altar banked with pissweed and dandelion flowers, statuettes and dozens of guttering candles.

  It was the sixteenth night the boy had seen a vision of the future in the rain clouds. He later told the press that in the vision he had foreseen a miraculous eddy opening beneath him, swallowing him entirely and admitting him into the ranks of the great saints and healers. The crowd saw no miracle yet, but several invalids and one or two with gel-sack rot claimed their condition had suddenly improved.

  At seven p.m. the boy rode through the waiting crowd on the shoulders of a neighbor in a hard rain. Paralytics, others with crutches and bandages followed, trying to be near the visionary boy. The parade of drenched jellyheads went along in a semi-circle until the boy grew dizzy and almost fainted.

  “Look! Look!” a rumor spread through the lot. “He is not getting wet. The rain doesn’t touch him. It is a miracle. This is the one who has come to save us.”

  But those closest to the boy said he was as wet as anyone.

  The concrete streets of the Quarter were cracked and sprouting weeds. Moldenke slowed down as he passed the Church of the Lark and its steeples. The odor of incense and beeswax drifted out into the street. Feeling a rumble in his bowels, an uncomfortable fullness, he went into the Church to get out of the sun and rest a few minutes, hoping to forestall an attack from the gut.

  There were votive candles burning warmly in red glass cups. A Sister of Comfort swept the aisles. Another busied herself draping statuary with purple chintz. A third arranged paper lilies on the altarpiece. Moldenke breathed as deeply as he could; the scent of frankincense had a calming effect on him. He sat in a back pew to wait for the spasm in his belly to pass, but it only grew worse. He lay down and closed his eyes, falling into a dreamlike half-sleep where he lost control and soiled himself.

  A light shake of the shoulder and a woman’s voice brought him out of his reverie. “Sir, you’ll find a public bath just down the street. Wash up there and have them boil those trousers.”

  “I am so sorry, Sister. It’s something I can’t avoid. I have an angry bowel, and I ate scrapple for breakfast.”

  “These things happen. Do hurry, though. We know the aide at the bath. He’s a very nice young freeborn man.”

  Moldenke found Public House #6 only a block
away. After showing his card and explaining the situation he was led by the bath aide to a small lavatory just off the vestibule and told to stand near the sink, remove his boots, socks, uniform trousers, and underdrawers. He did this while the aide watched. When he was finished the aide said, “Bathe in pool number one, then two, then three. These clothes will be clean and dry when you’re done.”

  There were a few other bathers floating languidly in pool one, in water the color of tea, soaping themselves then diving under for a rinse. The water in pool two was cleaner, and three was spring fed and clear.

  Feeling refreshed after a long soak in the pools, and with clean clothes, Moldenke ventured out onto Arden Boulevard. It had rained while he bathed, the streets were steaming, the air cooler, and there were reflective puddles on the sidewalk, each offering a blinding glimpse of the mid-day sun.

  He stopped at the Tea Off, a free-talk salon, and looked through the window. Kerd cakes and tea were being served to small groups of new arrivals sitting at tables. For some it was an odd thing to speak freely, to exchange so much information without the supervision they’d known in Bunkerville.

  When Moldenke entered and showed his pass he was given a slip of paper and a pencil. The host, who was busy brewing tea, said, “Print your name and list a couple of things you want to talk about. I’ll put it in that jar.”

  Moldenke found a seat at the counter, signed the paper and wrote:

  These are the things I would like to talk about. One: Who invented aerosol deformant and gave it to the jellies? Two: Angry bowel. What are the causes and remedies? Does anyone know?

  The host collected the paper from him and put it in the jar. As Moldenke waited his turn, he drank tea, smoked Juleps and listened to the talk, which, though ranging wide, was orderly and polite. No one spoke out of turn or overlong. The host saw to that with a little church bell he carried on a thong swinging from his belt. Ding-ding. “All right now, that’s enough about that,” he might say.

  A free man at another table talked about jellyheads. “They have a moving-picture mind. All life to them is a series of snapshots with no chance for time exposure. That’s why they can’t think straight on any subject. Their minds are a bundle of transient impressions and confused ideas. What are we going to do about them?”

  Ding Ding. “That’s enough about jellyheads. Next…?”

  A free woman said, “I wonder if it’s true, what Burke said in his Treatise, that if we were watching a scene in a stage play in which a man was being brutally beaten, and someone rushed in and yelled, ‘There’s a man being beaten to death outside,’ most of us would rush out there to see the real thing.”

  The host rapped a table. “Proving what? Who wouldn’t prefer a real beating to a staged one?” He pulled Moldenke’s name out of the jar. “You’re up, Moldenke. Table five. But first, here’s the real question. Why do jellyheads have deformant and we don’t?”

  Everyone gave it thought, but there were no immediate answers.

  Moldenke cleared his throat as he felt an uneasy twitch of his bowel. He worried that he wouldn’t get to all his talking points before having to run for the privy.

  There were no empty chairs at table five but someone at table four slid one over for him. He began: “One thing I’d like to bring up is aerosol deformant. Who invented it? And who put it on the City streets?”

  A free woman said, “And the victims of these deformings? Who are they? Always handsome females.”

  The host, attracted by the discussion, stood near table five with a tray of empty tea mugs. “Zanzetti certainly invented it, but he claims he didn’t give it to the jellies. One of his workers, a whistleblower, let them into the lab and they hauled off every can, the entire supply.”

  Another free woman asked, “What purpose is served by squirting us in the face with it? Why do they do it? Because we shoot them? Is that any reason?”

  “They have deformant and we have guns,” the host said. “Fair is fair. They’re as free as we are.”

  “I’ll tell you,” a free man wearing thick eyeglasses and a horsehair wig said, “it’s the difference between the sublime and the beautiful. Disfiguring beauty is a courageous and beneficial act. The horror of the victim’s new face is very, very sublime. I’ll take the sublime over the beautiful any day.”

  Moldenke raised his hand. “What about the angry bowel I have. How can I cure it?”

  “Watch what you eat. Stay away from scrapple.”

  “If you can ever find any cheese, eat that.”

  The host looked at his watch and rang his little bell. “The hours do go by. It’s already closing time. Everybody out. We’ll take up these issues and lots more at noon tomorrow.”

  After the Tea Off closed, Moldenke walked to the day market at number nine Arden Blvd., where he’d heard there was a public privy. He bought a pack of Juleps from a tobacconist. “Why would anyone smoke anything else but Juleps?” the man asked. “Plain, menthol cooled, or cork tipped?”

  “Plain for me,” Moldenke said.

  “Sorry, out of plain. Big shortage. Menthol cooled or cork tipped?”

  “The tipped then…By the way, is there a privy around here?” Moldenke opened the pack and lit a Julep.

  “Yessir, number seven. It’s up there close to Big Ernie’s Bakery.”

  “Thank you.” Moldenke pressed his palm to his bloated abdomen, the burning cigarette between his fingers. “I never know when I might need to use it.”

  A few shops down, he passed Zanzetti Scienterrifics. A fat little clown-suited barker outside tried to engage passersby. Standing next to him was a pitiably deformed young woman wearing a sheer veil. “Been deformed?” the barker shouted. “Improve that face! We can make them younger, handsomer, and more expressive. We can restore deformant-damaged faces faster than all the paint and powder in the world. In one week, you can throw your veil away. Guaranteed.”

  After crossing busy Arden Boulevard, Moldenke smelled fresh-baked bear claws. The strong, sweet, floury scent probably meant the claws had just been taken from the oven. A green light blinked above the doorway of Big Ernie’s Bakery. Forgetting for the moment that his bowel was angering, and passing the privy by, his mouth watered. He stepped inside the bakery, ordered a claw, and showed his card to the cashier, a young woman whose face had been deformed.

  She saw him staring at her. “You wouldn’t believe how pretty I used to be,” she said. “A jellyhead got me by the Park. I was just walking by. What’s the point of all this freedom when we’ve got jellyheads carrying deformant and using it whenever they want?” She turned sideways. “How do I look from the side?”

  Moldenke felt obliged to respond, but words were slow in coming, and when they did they were tentative. “You don’t look all that bad,” he heard himself saying.

  “Thank you, I suppose that’s a compliment.” She gave him the bear claw in a waxed bag. “My name’s Sorrel—after the plant, not the horse.”

  “I’m Moldenke, from Bunkerville.”

  “How long are you here for?”

  “Indefinite. Desecration of a grave. I’d rather not talk about it except to say it was an unavoidable accident. What about you?”

  “Came with my father. He got life. They just needed a baker over here. I don’t mind, though. I like Altobello. You can do what you want, except for the jellyheads. I hate them. If I had a gun I’d shoot my share.”

  Moldenke bit off a chunk of the pastry. It was crisp and sweet. “Oh, this is excellent an claw.” He sat at a sunny little table near the front window and ate the rest of it.

  Big Ernie came in from the back with a tray of fresh-baked claws and began lining them up in the display case.

  Moldenke breathed in the fragrant smell. “Give me another one, please, to go.”

  Big Ernie backed his head and shoulders out of the case and stood his full height. “Welcome to Altobello, my friend. You’re a free man.”

  “I can’t say it’s good to be here, but a person makes do. I
suppose I’ll look for some kind of work, employment somewhere. Best way to pass the time I hear.”

  “What’s the point of working if everything’s free? I got a passion for baking.”

  “I used to have a passion for the labor movement back home, but what’s the use of that here? I do have a yen for these claws, though. They’re far better than the best you can get in Bunkerville.”

  Big Ernie put a hammy hand on his hip and thought for a moment, then came to Moldenke’s table and whispered to him, “Look at that poor daughter of mine.” Moldenke glanced over at her. She was busy powdering her lumpy, misaligned cheeks. “A jellyhead did that, squirted her right in the face. No wonder she hates them. She wants a gun now. I tell her how hard they are to find. Can you do me a favor?”

  “What’s the favor?”

  “Poison that son of a bitch for me, the one that deformed her. He goes naked with a big swinging donniker and wears a snap-brim cap. You can’t miss him.”

  “I’ve never killed one. I’ve seen them killed with a firearm. I don’t know about poisoning them. How would I do that?”

  “Think of it like this: you won’t be killing him…I will. You’ll simply act as my agent. Here’s an example. If you were squirted with deformant, would you blame the deformant or the jellyhead that squirted you?”

  “The jellyhead, that’s obvious.”

  “You see my point?”

  “In a way, I do.”

  “The streetcars are running tomorrow. Catch the morning one to the Quarter, go to Smiley’s Meats. Get a couple of sausages and put them on my account. Then walk on to Goody’s Antique Hardware store for a tub of strong rat paste. Charge that, too. Take those sausages, split them open, and pack paste in there. I know that jellyhead loves sausages. There I was, coming back from Smiley’s one day and the filthy thing grabbed a bag of hot links right out of my hand and ran off. I could see him crouched behind a tree, eating them. So go to the Park and leave them by that old dead tree.”